Opinons and reports from the bridge table about card play, bidding, auctions and bidding theory.

Tuesday, February 5, 2008

Spingold decision

Last summer in Nashville, Spingold semi on vugraph vs Meckwell in the second set I look down at:

J3K9A643AJ652

All is vulnerable and Meckstroth opens 1H at my side of the screen. 'Nobrainer' pass or a 2C-overcall?

The warning signs are there and you can't count on weak opposition to bail you out if the overcall is wrong. They will extract whatever is there. But if partner is short in clubs, only the J of clubs is wasted and my hand is useful to a larger or lesser extent in diamonds and spades.

As you can 'guess', I have already made up my mind on my course of action in these situations. Why would I turn chicken now? I overcalled 2C. How did this go?

My overcall triggered a negative double from Rodwell and a 3C-raise from Frederic, passed out. At the other table there was the same opening, a 1S response and a 2H-rebid passed out when Hemant Lall [of course] didn't overcall. This was the full deal:

Sure was a thin opening in 1st position vulnerable but one also chosen by Antonio Sementa at the other table. 2H was an easy +140 and that QJ tight turned a 1 imp gain (-100) into a 6 imps gain (+110) when Jeff won the ace and continued H's.

That was lucky in a way, but on the other hand I caught a 4333 shape when a doubleton diamond would have made the overcall an easy winner, and had Meckstroth had AJxxxx maybe he'd bid 3H and Rodwell raised to 4H, permitting us to go plus on defence. Lot's of maybe's.

The overcall could have won in many ways, this was perhaps a 'flukie' kind of way but not that undeserved, in my [subjective] view.

As predicted, dummy had useful club honour's; there were no maybe involved in that 'fact'...

But typically they will only get you if there is a trump stack over you. If you get raised to 3♣ then they will probably find it more difficult than other top pairs as they are conservative doublers as they compete so aggressively.

This style seems to work reasonably well for them (British understatement here).

I would be more nervous against a pair like Helgemo/Helness, who seem to hot on the double trigger. But I'd still overcall 2♣.